Life on Earth older than thought?

[porphy]

A few observations on my part. I think the discussion is very interesting. I'm not here to help anyone out, but more to give my own view of the questions involved, which admittedly are complex and have entertained very much the best minds for a very long time.

If a natural law, formulated by science, is conditional in the way Aramike describes, that is saying. When ever the law doesn't apply to observations, changing conditions will explain this. (if not some other kind of error is found). Even history is called in to maintain this view, and the question is if there is, so far any example that contradicts this formulation.
This sounds, in itself, very much like a law like prediction based on observation and induction to me. Which means the discussion between Letum and Aramike haven't moved an inch, as Letum will maintain that you can't formulate laws based on empirical results and induction.
There is no way to logically exlude future cases where the law would not agree with the observations. That is a logical feature. What science have formulated as laws and how these have changed or not, is an historical and therefore empirical question, which will have to follow rules of language and logic as well. You can't really point to acctual history in order to strenghten or weaken a logical point.

Another way is the semantical part of it. It sounds as if conditional laws are made foolproof by a move in language. The law can't be wrong, as the conditions would have changed. I think Sir Karl Popper would have asked, is a scientific law and its theory backed up with this argument acctually possible to falsify? Any results that would show the law wrong, would be explained by changing conditions. But isn't this simply a way of trying to keep the concept of law as a kind of holy concept for science? The law was never wrong, beacuse now the conditions have changed. Or maybe the theory was wrong, but not the law, no not he law. Should conditions change back to the original, or we findt he correct theory, the law is still true. Of course, this is quite obvious, but is this a good stance in connection with the idea that science when formulating a natural law is based on empircal and fully testable (verification and falsification) work? It seems to me that the natural law risks to fall outside science this way.

However, it seems to me to be a good and proper way to do science as Aramike describes the situation. Of course one would look into the conditions, as they are what is supposed to explain and cause any law like observations. Anything else would be to give up scientific work as the idea of empirical research.
It might even be good reasons, pragmatically speaking for a concept of law in this "supra science" way. Scientist might work very well when using it.
It's like when Einstein maintained that some parts of what physics is, which he thought was given up in quantumm mechanis, was very important because those parts were the very thing that had made physics make progress. One of them was that it is possible to formulate fully objective and true laws of nature. Notice though, that Einstein, when discussing and arguing for the nature of scientific work, and natural law, didn't rely on how the concept of law works in science, but from a kind of outside position. This concept of natural law was the one that scientist had used during all the years, and it was crucial to keep it for future progress.
Taking one step back, this in turn makes it fulle possible that his argument can be proven wrong, even from a pragmatic point of view. Scientific progress might not at all have been that strongly connected to the idea of formulating objective laws of nature. Now, is the last sentence a point of logic or open to actual empirical research?

Ok, my thoughts of the day. I will now proceed to rock climbing again, where it holds very true, unfortunatly, that everthing that goes up, must come down....

cheers porphy

[Letum]

Originally Posted by Aramike

The past observation tells me that an object will always "come down" because the THEORIES predicting the occurence also agree.

The chicken had THEORIES predicting the occurrence of food at sunrise
that agreed with it's law about food at sunrise. It's law was still wrong.

Should this change, than the conditions will also have changed, rendering the law irrelevant.

There was no change in the condition of the chicken's world when it's neck
get wrung. It was always going to happen.

But seriously, are you trying to postulate the "what comes up must come down" may actually just suddenly change? If so, the concept is no more sophisticated than a simple "God-done-it". If the law were to change, than the facts that were the basis of the law will have changed as well, thusly rendering the law invalid.

There might be a 50/50 chance that what goes up sometimes keeps going
up. Just because you flip a coin 10 billion times and get heads, it doesn't
mean you won't get tails the next time. We can't tell.
No change is required, 50/50 chance that what goes up sometimes keeps
going up might have been true for all eternity, we just have been unlucky
not to observe it yet.
How ever unlikely this it, we can't be 100% sure it is not the case.

The LAW is CONDITIONAL - all things being exactly as they are now, what goes up must come down. Should that change, the conditions must also change. This is the key to the rules to logic (something cannot both exist and not exist at the same time).

I'm going to repeat my self here because you consistently fail to show any
serious understanding of the problem's of induction (did you read the wiki
link?).
If the starting conditions in the world are:
"what goes up must come down, but 0.0000[...]000001% of the time it will
keep going up "
And we observe billions of times that things that go up, come down and
then decide on the law:
"what goes up must come down"

Our law is wrong because there is a non zero chance that what goes up
won't come down without any change in the conditions we are
observing.

...let's say that using my legs and feet in a certain matter over a specific terrain in certain conditions causes me to walk. We'll call it the Law of Walking. Should my using the same appendages in the same manner result in a different result, would not the conditions have changed, meaning the Walking Law is irrelevant?

Yes, but if the conditions stayed the same and something other than
walking happened, the law must be wrong.

This is a question of semantics and logic. If we were to throw those out in favor of a "we never know anything" philosophy, why not just abandon science altogether?

We can still keep science whilst abandoning the idea that we can find
truths through induction. As porphy mentioned, K.Popper has a very neat
solution that allows us to create laws without claiming they are true.
I think I have mentioned elsewhere that I am a big fan of Popper and I think
he is vastly under rated.

[Letum]

Originally Posted by porphy

If a natural law, formulated by science, is conditional in the way Aramike describes, that is saying. When ever the law doesn't apply to observations, changing conditions will explain this. (if not some other kind of error is found). Even history is called in to maintain this view, and the question is if there is, so far any example that contradicts this formulation.
This sounds, in itself, very much like a law like prediction based on observation and induction to me.

Whats more, it is a tautology, as you say Popper may have pointed out,
as there is no possible falsification if any data that does not follow the law
can be explained by Aramike as a change in conditions.

...Letum will maintain that you can't formulate laws based on empirical results and induction.

You are right about induction, but I do think you can base laws on empirical
results, provided that you have an infinite amount of results from every
possible time.
However, with a little Cartesian doubt, I don't think we can collect any results, let alone an
infinite set, but that's a whole new kettle of fish.

[Aramike]

We're going in circles. The bottom line is that science agrees with me. But here's a fun one:

There might be a 50/50 chance that what goes up sometimes keeps going
up. Just because you flip a coin 10 billion times and get heads, it doesn't
mean you won't get tails the next time. We can't tell.
No change is required, 50/50 chance that what goes up sometimes keeps
going up might have been true for all eternity, we just have been unlucky
not to observe it yet.
How ever unlikely this it, we can't be 100% sure it is not the case.

There is 100% no chance that something, under the same conditions, will keep going up. If so, then the conditions (gravity attracting mass) will have changed to allow that single object to keep going up, thusly invalidating the law in that circumstance.

There is no doubt that there is the phenomenom of a scientific law. It is a term used daily by scientists worldwide. The idea that something may just keep going up despite known conditions is preposterous. One doesn't need an infinite number of results to prove a scientific concept - all that is needed is a consistant, predictable result. In the case of invalidating the law of something going up and coming down, the burden of proof lies with the person making the unobservable claim (that something may keep going up).

[Letum]

Originally Posted by Aramike

[...]all that is needed is a consistant, predictable result.

Like the constant, predictable result the chicken had?

ed: also, it is ridiculous to say that 'science agrees' with you.
The induction problem has been one of the most hotly debated issues
in meta-science since the mid 1700s and continues to be so. No
consensus has been reached at all.

[porphy]

We're going in circles. The bottom line is that science agrees with me.

I don't think scientists as a whole agrees with you. Most scientists I have talked to on the very issue clearly favour a popperian approach. They do think his critique against inductive knowledge do point out the logical faults in this kind of reasoning. Maybe scientist, few or many, work on a daily basis with this approach of yours, that is another thing, that does not mean they are right about the justification of the concept, or that their results when formulating law like expressions automatically is a natural law in the sense you maintain.

But here's a fun one:There is 100% no chance that something, under the same conditions, will keep going up. If so, then the conditions (gravity attracting mass) will have changed to allow that single object to keep going up, thusly invalidating the law in that circumstance.

That really is a non convincing example Aramike. All that is concluded is arrived at from the very idea that we do know the natural law in question to be true, absolutely true under the conditions stated. The discussion is about if this very idea about natural law can be maintained, and still be part of science as based on inductive empirical findings and testable results contained in a theory possible to falsify.

This theme is a quite old question by now, but still very important, and it is a centre piece of classical philosophy of science. The idea of absolute truths as part of science, or that absolute true natural laws would be the crowning hallmark of scientific work has had it's fair share of critique since the early nineteenth centaury. (Just have a look at positivism, conventionalism, logical empiricism, critical rationalism etc. All these "isms" also have had prominent scientists in their ranks as well, not that this concludes what is correct in a straight forward way.)
I would say it is very uncommon to find the idea of science arriving at absolute true natural laws these days, especially when defended by conditional circumstances the way it is presented here. It is probably because it can't be maintained with any convincing argument.

There is no doubt that there is the phenomenom of a scientific law. It is a term used daily by scientists worldwide. The idea that something may just keep going up despite known conditions is preposterous. One doesn't need an infinite number of results to prove a scientific concept - all that is needed is a consistant, predictable result. In the case of invalidating the law of something going up and coming down, the burden of proof lies with the person making the unobservable claim (that something may keep going up).

Yes, the phenomenon of natural law exists, but you describe it as something which can be found and absolutely verified through simply observing how science works when formulating said laws. Yes scientist use the term of natural law everyday, together with thousands of other terms, but do they use the term the way you say?
Most people that have looked into this question would say that natural law in that sense is metaphysics, as it can't in itself be part of a science confined to empirical research, inductive logic and testing.

I don't think this means that scientist should throw out the concept of natural law, but maybe it is as Popper once said, there is good metaphysics in science and bad metaphysics, good metaphysical statements, or even full research programs, can be transformed to or contain real scientific problems, which can give us scientific knowledge and theories that can be tested further, if needed. But the metaphysical concept can't by some magic guarantee scientific truth. If one follows Poppers line of thought, any science that claim absolute truth, even when it comes to natural law, is simply no science, or one have misunderstood the nature of science.

To me it seems like your finishing lines of the last paragraph is much more in line with the popperian idea, but you prefer to pass the burden of proof to anyone disputing or doubting the absolute truth of the natural law in question. But this can't be right, as the question is not about if things do continue up or not, but what grounds we have to claim the concept of natural law as expressing something absolutely true. This is not the same thing as discussing if things do fall or not.
I don't doubt the natural law in question, but I can't see that science can have a concept about natural law that will not in itself contain the possibility of being proved wrong. And I can't see that I should need to put forward examples of phenomenon that invalidates the law in order to come to the conclusion that this idea of natural law rests on shaky grounds when it comes to its rational and logical justification. If the concept of natural law is supposed to be scientifically justified and mean anything clear, it needs to be possible to prove it wrong, but not necessarily proven wrong. You want the latter from those who oppose this idea of absolute natural law, but deny the first by your reasoning about natural law under specified conditions. So how is one supposed to show a counter example if your conclusion in advance is, that as things now continue upwards, conditions have changed, and we have a new formulation of true law under different conditions?

When you complain about preposterous claims, it seems more like a fall back on some kind of common sense and well tried experience, which in a way is fine, but it will not prove your stance about natural law in science, as science is mostly thought of as the institution that test the validity of knowledge derived from common sense and everyday experience.

By the way, I did fall down when rock climbing, as expected and predicted, both by science and by me, but I don't take that as a reason for science as legitimately incorporating a concept about absolute natural laws. If I would have continued up though, I would have been surprised indeed and I very much would like to know why this happened. But I would certainly not say: that was weird, but it's still good to know that science still always operates with and formulates fully true natural laws, regardless of what my findings about the conditions for this incident shows.

Time for coffee!

cheers Porphy

[Letum]

Originally Posted by porphy

Most scientists I have talked to on the very issue clearly favour a popperian approach.

They do!?
We need more Swedish scientists!

Most I have talked to are old school positivists when pushed on the matter.
I suspect it's more to do with lack of interest in the subject, rather than
anything so quaint as genuine positivism, not that it doen't still exist.

I have always been left with the impression that science has never really
taken Popper seriously on board, which I think is a shame.

[porphy]

Originally Posted by Letum

They do!?
We need more Swedish scientists!

Most I have talked to are old school positivists when pushed on the matter.
I suspect it's more to do with lack of interest in the subject, rather than
anything so quaint as genuine positivism, not that it doen't still exist.

I have always been left with the impression that science has never really
taken Popper seriously on board, which I think is a shame.

You might be right about the "pushed on the matter". I'm not sure though if they go popperian when pushed, or positivist when pushed...

In my line of work I mostly meet scientists with a philosophical and historical interest in science, so that might be part of the explanation for them finding Popper a good choice.

Of course the problems in philosophy of science doesn't end with Popper. Maybe Wittgenstein was right when saying something like: "When you do philosophy, you run into philosophical problems." That probably goes also for anyone trying to account for science, natural law, knowledge and truth.

cheers Porphy

[Letum]

I would have expected Wittgenstein to say "When you do philosophy, you run
into lingual problems.", which is why I don't get on with him very well.

It seams clear to be that meaning precedes language, but there are one or
two people on this forum that seam to agree with Wittgenstein, much to my
annoyance.

Ed: Especially when accused of 'semantics'.

[porphy]

Originally Posted by Letum

I would have expected Wittgenstein to say "When you do philosophy, you run
into lingual problems.", which is why I don't get on with him very well.

It seams clear to be that meaning precedes language, but there are one or
two people on this forum that seam to agree with Wittgenstein, much to my annoyance.

Sorry if I should annoy you. The meaning of the phrase is indeed more like the variation you gave, as Wittgenstein vehemently denied the existence of any real philosophical problems. But I would not describe him as saying that philosophy is only a semantic problem or a matter of hopeless work with definitions, where one should do science instead. It's more like you come to and are drawn into problems in language in another way than with a scientific problem, therefore the solution is not like in science or scientific.
The idea with the original quote is more like, if you do philosophy as if it was a kind of science, you will certainly run into philosophical problems, as they only exist in that form with this attitude to philosophy. You will then often try to solve them as a scientific problem with theories and systems, and then fail or at least find yourself less than satisfied.

Popper famously said to Wittgenstein that there got to be at least one real philosophical problem, and that is if there are real philosophical problems or not. Needless to say their discussion didn't go much further after that!

I'm not sure what to make of the idea that meaning precedes language, but I think that might need a new thread with its own topic!

[Letum]

Originally Posted by porphy

I'm not sure what to make of the idea that meaning precedes language...

I think it was Russell that first said words to the effect of "meaning precedes
language", even tho he never got very involved in the linguistic/anti-linguistic
thing that went on in the UK all around him in his later years.


I think it is very self evident that you can have an idea before you have
the words to express it.
You can have a philosophical problem before you have words to describe it.

If someone tells me about problem A and I do not understand them, they
might tell me about it using different words. That does not mean they are
now talking about a different problem. The words come from the problem,
not the problem from the words.

Even problems like what does it mean to ask "is the king of France bald?"
can be solved by looking at the concepts behind the words as opposed to
the concepts that arise from the words.


It seams ridiculous to me that anyone could think that the words of a
problem happen before the concept, ideas or meaning of the problem.
So far as I can see, all problems are problems of ideas and concepts, not
of words and semantics. If you find a semantic problem it is most likely
because someone is doing a poor job of explaining the concept behind the
words they are getting tripped up over.

I'll go and see if I can dig up some quotes...

[Skybird]

That meaning precedes language, and only in this order, is a highyl questionable argument. From a psychological standpoint possibly as well well as a linguistical, language also influence meaning, and the options for us to create meaning. Language feeds back on thought, thought feeds back on language. Just compare wetsenr languages, and Chinese languages. I remember to have had a thread some longer time ago pointing at scientific research that shows that chinese and Westerners not only vaguels think in different patterns, but that the differences indeed cause different hardcoding of neurons inside the brain.

I must be a bit vague here, since I do not remember source and names anymore, and at that time just took a random interest in it. But it is in no contradiction to what I know in general on the matter, and even supports that. We know for sure that langauge habits chnage the brain on a hardware basis. Thus very different languages indeed can indicate different ways of thinking and perceiving the "world" indeed.

For us, only conceptions and ideas make any sense that could be expressed by the tools the languages we speak can express in words. the world for which we have no words, to us is very much a non-existing world. That's why some foreign cultural ideas and views of the world, from the Aborigines' dreamtime to Asian Chan are so extremely tough for us to adequately describe in words - and thus so many fail to really understand what they are about. We often enforce our own schemes and patterns on top of them instead, and then consider ourselves to have a full understanding of what the orginal ideas mean. but we just understand our schematic abstraction of them, which may - or may not have much to do with the original.

Meaning and language is less a philosophical but more or less a scientific problem.

I assume that the more data science produce on a given issue, the more related philosophical problems shift from the field of philosophy into the field of science, much like scinece already has made much of former relgious staements obsolete.

By that I do not wish to say that science will necessarily one day come up with ultimate answers to all unknown issues. Indeed, new scientific insight necessaarily seems to create new unknowns as well. But philosophy alone is just like playing solitaire. It doesn'T really lead you anywhere, ever. That'S why traditions like for example Zen completely skip it, bypass it, ignore it, prevent it, and dismiss theoretical teaching as misguiding, useless, and being an obstacle only. that'S what makes it for wetsern intellectualy so incredibly difficult to "handle/deal with/accept" it.

[Letum]

Originally Posted by Skybird

But philosophy alone is just like playing solitaire. It doesn'T really lead you anywhere, ever.

I contest that strongly.
It has lead many people many places, been the basis for governments, new
religions, new ways of thinking about science and life. It has spawned
countless works of literature, art and all manner of creative works.
All the science, math and historical studies are the result new philosophical
ideas bracing out into subjects that became independent.

Western philosophy may be out of the scope of religio-philosophical ideas like
zen, but zen if far from out of the reach of western philosophy. That is zen's
loss.

Originally Posted by Skybird

Meaning and language is less a philosophical but more or less a scientific problem.

Many would disagree with that, both in science and in phillosophy. It is certinaly no given.

[porphy]

Originally Posted by Letum

I think it was Russell that first said words to the effect of "meaning precedes
language", even tho he never got very involved in the linguistic/anti-linguistic
thing that went on in the UK all around him in his later years.


I think it is very self evident that you can have an idea before you have
the words to express it.
You can have a philosophical problem before you have words to describe it.

If someone tells me about problem A and I do not understand them, they
might tell me about it using different words. That does not mean they are
now talking about a different problem. The words come from the problem,
not the problem from the words.

Even problems like what does it mean to ask "is the king of France bald?"
can be solved by looking at the concepts behind the words as opposed to
the concepts that arise from the words.


It seams ridiculous to me that anyone could think that the words of a
problem happen before the concept, ideas or meaning of the problem.
So far as I can see, all problems are problems of ideas and concepts, not
of words and semantics. If you find a semantic problem it is most likely
because someone is doing a poor job of explaining the concept behind the
words they are getting tripped up over.

I'll go and see if I can dig up some quotes...

I'm actually quite sure Wittgenstein would have thought your view very worthwhile, at least the last paragraph. He didn't like Russells take on meaning and language though. Russell also did admit that Wittgenstein in personal discussions destroyed his belief in what he set out to accomplish with in Principia Mathematica.

Edit: Myself I agree with the later sentences of yours, but I'm not sure it is self evident that I can have an idea, a philosophical problem without words that have meaning through language. Private language is much thought of as a strange idea. If different words does mean a different problem explained can't really be known in advance, but I agree that there is no rule saying that as soon you change a word, the problem will change. But sometimes I think this do happen, but not as a result of me simply using a different word, but possibly an inappropriate word.

One could understand a lot of what W was involved in as getting clear about our concepts, after stumbling around among our words. Hence the desire to get an overview, finding bedrock and let the fly out of the bottle.
It's has been quite common to read W as if use of words automatically gives them meaning, which of course is absurd. That would be a very simple theory of meaning, and a pretty bad one. Wittgenstein was very thorough when looking in to how we use some specific words and in what contexts, but that is not the same as putting forward a theory of meaning along the line, use is meaning, or some slogan like that.
As far as I know Wittgenstein showed very little interest in coming up with a theory of meaning, it is very common though that people conclude that they can show that this or that is his theory of meaning by showing bits and pieces of his writing. Such a view do neglect his persistent ideas about a new method of doing philosophy. The later Wittgenstein is still mostly engaged with the problem from his early (in)famous Tractaus, namely the limits of meaningful language, but one could understand his later work as if they really live up to the famous last paragraph in Tractatus, that is, what you can't say in a meaningful way, you have to be silent about. He really tries to avoid talking nonsense or using words in an idle way in his later writing.

I like to quote Arthur Eddington when he writes something like: What is an electron, really? The only answer to give, is that what an electron really is, is part of the ABC of physics.

The original question is pointed out to be idle. It tries to reach outside the limit of language, in this case scientific language. It's like hoping for a kind of short cut. But this phenomenon have counterparts in what we usually call everyday language as well, and many everyday examples look like they would have an answer in science, but they don't, because science as a practise rely on ordinary language as well, even if it's full of obscure definitions, symbols and logic, and technical words and concepts.

ok, enough, I'm rambling on... I'm no real expert on these things and now I'm writing off the top of my head about quite difficult things, but given a good and proper introduction to W I think you can find good stuff in his writings, if you are interested in concepts, ideas and language, without reducing it to semantics and words only!

cheers porphy

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Letum

I contest that strongly.
It has lead many people many places, been the basis for governments, new
religions, new ways of thinking about science and life. It has spawned
countless works of literature, art and all manner of creative works.
All the science, math and historical studies are the result new philosophical
ideas bracing out into subjects that became independent.

Western philosophy may be out of the scope of religio-philosophical ideas like
zen, but zen if far from out of the reach of western philosophy. That is zen's
loss.

Zen includes all that, and goes beyond it. No man has ever realised the true nature of man and found true freedom - by philosophising. Instead he formed argument pro and contra why this and that constructions of his ego and intellect shall be lablled that, or shall not. That creates conflict, of course. The stoic does so. The hedonist does so. But that is not the quality itself, just an imagination of it's description.

You probably know that story from Zen that the finger pointing at the moon is not the moon itself. What you do with all your clever mindgames is painting your nails with different colours and than arguing which one meets the looks of a hand and five finger more nice than others. the moon is just an imagination for you, since you do not care to raise your head and just look at it - you were too busy with painting your fingernails. Because how should you ever find and understand the moon if your fingernails are not signal-coloured, and pointy?

I observed this tendency in you many times over the past years. It is not meant as a personal attack on you. I see it as an intellect that goes wild and does not know nor care when enough is enough.

You are a clever guy, Letum , I really think so although sometimes you killed my nerves with your hobby. But maybe you are too clever. You even remind me a bit of myself when I was around age 20, 22. But you are also an extreme theoretician. Leave the words and thoughts behind a bit. Take a breath. Perceive. Witness. Do not want to comment. Do not want to judge. Do not want not to want not. "Zen" - is just a word with three letters, nothing more. It means nothing, and therefore, it means everything. People are too obsessed with words. Especially if they promise the flavour of exotic places. That often ends with digestion problems, like your comments on Zen for example.